Prince of Lies - James Lowder [37]
Cursing into his beard, the dwarf rushed to the other side of the room, where a lantern sat upon a long bench. He grabbed it roughly. "Get a flint," he hissed as he dumped oil on a nearby pile of parchment.
Rinda scowled and gestured for him to stop. "If this were a raid," she whispered, "they wouldn't have knocked."
Despite her own reassurances, Rinda overturned a mug of water onto a forged set of identity papers as she moved to the door. No sense taking too many chances.
The two men standing on the threshold were typical of the thugs theChurchofCyricemployed. They leaned against the jamb, idly picking splinters from the rotting wood with shivs. One was fat, with a bristling beard and heavy-lidded eyes. The other was small and lithe. His round-shouldered stoop and the dark rings circling his eyes made Rinda think of the weasels that lived in the river outside the city. Both men wore fur-trimmed cloaks over their shabby clothes. Only their red armbands identified them as churchmen, emblazoned as they were with Cyric's holy symbol – a leering white skull surrounded by a black sun.
"Let's see," the small one said. He unfolded a ragged scrap of paper. "Brown hair. Medium height. Slender build." Wrinkling his face, he squinted up at Rinda in the failing afternoon light. "Yeah, green eyes, too. This is her, Worvo."
"You Rinda, daughter of Bevis the Illuminator?" the fat one asked. Even his words were bloated, full of round vowels and slurred consonants.
Rinda crossed her arms over her chest. "And if I am?"
"Just answer the question, awright?" The weaselly thug spit onto the street and looked around. "We ain't got all day on this."
Like a barricade being rolled into place, Hodur swaggered between Rinda and the thugs. "You got the wrong place. There ain't no Rinda here."
Worvo blinked a few times then let his mouth hang open in an idiot's gape. "We do? There ain't? Hey, Var, if this ain't-"
"Of course it's her," Var snapped. "She's supposed to be smart, right? A scribe." He gestured to Hodur's eye patch with his dagger. "Even a blind old gin-head like this could see she ain't like anyone else around. Her clothes are clean. She's even bathed this month, from the looks of her." He licked his thin lips. "And she's even awake during the daytime. Probably the only woman within a mile of here who don't wake up at sundown – unless her little one-eyed friend here just got her out of bed."
Hodur balled one trembling hand into a fist and grabbed the front of Var's tunic with the other. Both thugs leveled their knives at the dwarf, but Rinda pulled him back from the door before trouble could start. She'd seen Hodur fight. Despite his infirmities, he was more than a match for the two scruffy churchmen – and five more like them. But if a scuffle broke out, the watch might show up, and that meant trained killers. Probably mages, too.
"It's all right, Hodur," she said calmly. The hard look in her eyes cowed the dwarf, and he stepped back into the room.
"So are you Rinda or not?" Worvo asked.
"Yes. What business does the church have with me?"
"Like I said before, you're a scribe, right?" Var nodded for her. "The church needs your services. That's all you need to know."
Rinda frowned. "But I'm not a member of the guild. They can't hire me if I'm not-"
"I didn't say you was going to get paid for this," Var said. He turned to his fat companion. "Did I say this was a paying job?"
"Uh, no, Var."
"See, I thought I was being perfectly clear." He reached out and took Rinda by the arm. "The church wants a scribe with some smarts, and you fit the bill. So, let's get going, awright?"
Rinda reached around the doorjamb and grabbed the thin cloak that hung by the door. "Stay here until I come back, Hodur. Don't worry. I'll be all right."
Flanked by the churchmen, she hurried away from her home, through alleys shrouded with the lengthening shadows of twilight. "Where are you taking me?" she asked.
"Not far," Var replied. His beady eyes darted back and forth, taking stock of every figure huddled in a